Holding Out
by Trialia
Summary: Looking back on a series of firsts. Vague 4x01-4x02 spoilers.


Title: Holding Out

Author: Trialia

Fandom: Battlestar Galactica (2003)

Rating: K+

Word Count: 817

Character(s)/Pairing(s): Laura Roslin/Bill Adama

Spoilers: comprehensive through S3, vague 4x01-4x02

Challenge - amesoeur - firsts (90 mins)

Beta-reader: Tara (lilyayl)

Summary: Looking back on a series of firsts.

xxx

It's been a long time since they first touched each other.

It wasn't in pleasure, wasn't in dislike, wasn't even a simple handshake; just the Commander placing his hand a little way over the outstretched fingers of the Secretary of Education as she tried in vain to turn the wheel on the hatch into Galactica's command centre. He'd not been in the best of moods with her at the time, as she remembers: it wasn't long after she'd made the suggestion that Galactica's computers be networked.

She's so glad, now, that he held out on that matter.

There are other things he's held out on, though, that she's not so happy about.

Their relationship is one of those things.

She remembers (doesn't know why) the progression of their friendship: from the start, irritation with each other, morphing into something like cooperation and a grudging respect; then came that dance, Colonial Day year one (as she thinks of it now) where their friendship, and an attraction she'd not even known she had, sparked into a tiny ember of life that was quickly, deliberately damped down.

Then came what she's sure he thinks of as her betrayal, and his coup against her. It was when Lee told her he'd been shot in the chest that she realised how _much _she felt. She'd pushed it all aside, fiercely telling herself that it didn't matter, that he didn't feel the same and even if he did, he'd thrown her in the brig for Kobol's sake (and how strange it feels to be saying that, when they have found Kobol). She escaped, with his son at her side, not for a second allowing herself to think about what that might mean to Bill Adama if - when - he woke up. Made it to Kobol, and then...

_He came for me._

He'd had a gun in Lee's face just for a second, and she stared. Couldn't quite believe he was there, in actual fact. Why would he come to this place, at this time, with these people? She stared. Wondered. Hoped, even-- and her hopes were fulfilled as she found he'd decided to aid the search. Wondered, for just a moment, if he _were _here for her... but no. _For the people._

She'd keep telling herself that, for another six months or so.

Before Cain had come and threatened his life so that she, Laura, could no longer deny (at least to herself) what it was she felt for him. But there was no time, then, and the closest they could have to a happy ending was for him to kiss her, four days before she _died _for the first time.

She'd died; died and been brought back to life. He'd been there at her bedside, as much as appearances would allow him. She'd been too focused on getting well again, just then, to think about what that had meant.

Their friendship grew, and grew warmer, as warm as it could be short of anything... inappropriate.

Dear Gods, how she wanted 'inappropriate'.

She'd been getting colder. She knew it even if he didn't; she didn't want him to follow her down that road. Wouldn't tell him that it was to avoid sullying that remarkable innocence (how to have such innocence in a man who'd fought in two wars, if she knew that she'd know everything) that she'd given in and let Baltar, legitimately (after a fashion) win his election to her office of President.

She didn't know when she'd started thinking of it as _her _office.

New Caprica, and everything went to hell in the end but them. _Just us two. _A year of having a break from being chased, of forging new relationships on a planet that wasn't Earth but that she thought, one day, might grow on her like the herbal cigarettes she'd made there. Like Bill Adama had grown on her -- the thought made her stop a giggle with her fist. She'd been lying on his chest at the time, so he asked her about it. Mellow, relaxed, affectionate. She almost blushed and, instead of explaining, stretched up to kiss him.

Another first. Somehow, he hadn't seemed surprised when she dragged him to her tent not long after.

If only it could have lasted.

Laura and Bill, instead of President and Admiral.

She's smiling now, though: curled up in his bed on their fifth Colonial Day, warm and temporarily safe. He's not holding out anymore, and so she feels protected. Doesn't want to think about the fact that she may die any time in the _next _year, the year to come, so she won't think about it. Six months or six years, Cottle had said, depending on the success level of the treatment.

She'd take the second estimate.

For now, right now, she's happy.

"It's good to see you smile," he says. He sounds like he means it.


End file.
